UK Bit -- Sportingbet said yesterday that its sports book handle has grown to almost half of that of Nevada. Sports books in Nevada took in $2,007,152,347 during the time period, while Sportingbet took in $985,758,780. Sportingbet, which has been vocal about its desire to be regulated in the United States, says its annual growth rate is 25 percent per year, a figure that puts Nevada's yearly decline of 4.7 percent to shame.
Scandanavian Bit -- Sweden's Net Entertainment today announced the launch of its newest online slot machine, Wild West Slot, which it claims has more interactive content "than ever seen on the Internet before." Bet limits are from 10 cents to $9, and players can choose to play with anywhere from one to nine lines. The game will be available at CherryCasino.com.
Bit from Down Under -- Gaming software developer Access Gaming Systems Ltd. is reporting an increase in use of its Games Development Kit among its lottery and casino clients in Europe and Australia. Paul Barnes, vice president of sales and marketing, said one of the company's European lottery clients is launching a new animated instant game that will join the 10 games already available on its site. "The work was designed and implemented by the lottery's in-house staff with only small input from AGS," he said. "Further games are under development and will be released soon."
Bit from Greece -- U.K. lawyer Steven Phillipsohn weighed in on a Greek law that had banned all computer gaming but was amended this week to only outlaw computer games resulting in monetary benefit to the player (i.e. gambling). Phillipsohn, a senior partner at Phillipsohn Crawfords Berwald, said the intention of the law was good, but the method it used to fight online betting was all wrong. "The Greeks are to be congratulated for recognizing that online fraudsters are setting up gaming sites that take your money but
never pay out ... There needs to be coordinated action and the EU should take a lead to draw up a community-wide approach," he said. "By going it alone, Greece has made a mess of things, and we can only tackle the problem by coordinated international action."